Johnson & Johnson Misses Beat
With Device for Cardiac Surgery

Four years ago, Johnson & Johnson sparked a revolution in the treatment of coronary-artery disease with a new medical device called a stent.

Few devices have yielded such an immediate eye-popping bonanza for their manufacturer. Doctors rushed to use the tiny metal scaffold to prop open obstructed heart vessels. In just 37 months, the New Brunswick, N.J., health-care giant tallied more than $1 billion of stent sales and garnered more than 90% of a remarkably profitable U.S. market.